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Cabin Fever | Travel Hacks with Boston Travel Startups

Thursday, march 2, 2017 @ 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm, event navigation.

• « Networking Evening with Talk by Stefania Mallett
• TCN Upstart: Making Boston Great for Female Founders w/ Courtney Scrubbs »

For Day 4 we are partnering up with Hopper and other local travel startups to share the best Travel Hacks that everyone should know before planning their next adventure in 2017!

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About the Experts

Sasha Hoffman

CEO , Fuzzy Compass

Sasha Hoffman’s love of fashion, finance and travel have guided her career from creating luxury business bags for women to leading IPOs for major technology companies.

She is currently the CEO of Fuzzy Compass, a travel startup turning the world’s top travel influencers into modern-day travel agents. She is also Chief Operating Officer of Piaggio Fast Forward, a new company of Milan-based Piaggio Group, makers of Vespa, Aprilia, and Moto Guzzi focused on lightweight transportation and autonomous vehicles for rapidly changing urban areas. Prior to that, she was Head of Business Development for Plastiq, a venture-backed payments startup. As the second hire, she was responsible for many aspects of the business but primarily growing the company from 2-27 employees, setting the strategy for entering new industries and geographies, building and maintaining all partner relationships and growing the company to over $150mm in payments volume in under 2 years.

Prior to that, she worked as an investment banker in the technology group at Goldman Sachs, Barclays Capital and Lehman Brothers, where she advised clients, built complex financial models, coordinated deals and managed teams. She worked on transactions worth more than $100 billion including several high-profile IPOs and M&A deals for such clients as Facebook, Yelp, and SanDisk.

Sasha is the Global Ambassador for Women in Travel, part of Phocuswright’s 2015 Class of 35 under 35 leaders in the travel industry and her company was ranked one of the hottest startups launched in 2015. She is passionate about tech and social entrepreneurship and is an active member of the community. She is part of the Board of BUILD Boston, a TechStars mentor, a Mass Challenge alumni company, an instructor at General Assembly, Youth CITIES, and the Startup Institute, is part of the Future Leaders Group of MITX, and guest lectures at Northeastern University.

Jonathan Ronzio

Adventurer, Filmmaker, and Founder , Explore Inspired

Jonathan Ronzio is an adventurer, conservationist, and international speaker, best known for directing and starring in the award-winning documentary, “Between The Peaks.” He is also the founder of adventure-philanthropy blog and expedition series, Explore Inspired.

At 11 years old, Ronzio began following his older brother down the entrepreneurial road, and the two worked together for over a decade building a video production company that become one of the nation’s largest event video providers, selling over $2 million in youth sporting event videos. In 2011, after graduating Bryant University, Jonathan chased a dream to the mountains. That dream would become “Between The Peaks.”

Since, Ronzio has been to 30 countries and 6 continents, volunteered throughout the Americas, climbed 2 of the Seven Summits (with his third set for June 2017), splitboarded the glaciated volcanoes of the Pacific Northwest, backpacked New Zealand’s South Island, sailed the Gulf of Mexico, and much more. Through Explore Inspired, Ronzio designs expeditions to promote branded adventure content while addressing some of today’s most pressing social and environmental concerns. Additionally, Ronzio is a singer/songwriter and Elite OCR athlete, having competed on NBC’s Spartan: Ultimate Team Challenge.

At the core of Jonathan’s many pursuits is a mission to inspire others to escape the confines of comfortability, chase their own unconventional dreams, and positively impact the world along the way. He currently resides in Boston, MA with his wife, Team USA Pairs Figure Skater, Alexandria Shaughnessy, and their dog, Benji.

About Our Partners

MassChallenge

MassChallenge is the most startup-friendly accelerator on the planet. No equity and not-for-profit, we are obsessed with helping entrepreneurs across any industry. We also reward the highest-impact startups through a competition to win a portion of several million dollars in equity-free cash awards. Through our global network of accelerators in Boston, London, Jerusalem, Geneva, Mexico City and unrivaled access to our corporate partners, we can have a massive impact — driving growth and creating value the world over. Learn more and apply here ! 2017 applications close March 28th!

Explore Inspired

Explore Inspired blends adrenaline-fueled exploration with humanitarian and conservation work to create adventure content that inspires change.

Hopper is an award-winning airfare prediction app available for iOS and Android devices. Hopper analyzes billions of flight prices a day to provide advice on when to fly and buy. Hopper predicts price changes for your trip, notifies you when to book, and offers the fastest way to book a flight. Visit www.hopper.com for more information and to download the free app.

Featured jobs...

Online Travel Startups in Boston, United States

Membership based car sharing club

Zipcar is a membership-based car-sharing company that provides automobile rentals to its members, billable on an hourly or daily basis. Members are able to view vehicle availability and reserve a self-service car via the internet, iPhone app, or telephone, in increments as short as one hour and pay only for the time they reserve. Zipcar vehicles report their positions to a control center using in-car technology. Zipcar was founded in 2000 by Cambridge, Massachusetts. On October 31, 2007, Zipcar merged with rival Flexcar. In 2009 Zipcar has become the world’s largest car-sharing service, sharing 6,000 vehicles among 275,000 drivers in 49 U.S. cities, Vancouver, Toronto, and London. On April 1, 2010, Zipcar bought London-based car-sharing firm Streetcar in its latest bid to expand across Europe. Zipcar IPO'ed in April 2011 and at the end of its first day of trading as a public company, Zipcar was valued at approximately $1.1 billion. Zipcar was bought by Avis Budget Group in Jan-2013 for around $500M in cash.

Online bus tickets booking platform

Wanderu is an Online-based platform for booking bus tickets. Uses can book tickets by providing details like location, passenger details, and more. It uses advanced routing algorithm searches for various operators on the platform. It offers various features like real-time tracking, compare various operators, etc. The mobile app is available for both Android & iOS devices.

App-based booking platform for business travelers

Lola is an app-based booking platform for business travelers. It allows users to plan, book air tickets, accommodation, car rentals & manage their business trips. It also provides business travelers with customer support & concierge service. The app is available on iOS & Android devices.

Expense management and card solutions for small businesses

Expense management and card solutions for small businesses. It features solutions for employee expense management, the ability to issue cards, approves transactions, employee expenses and reimbursements, and more. It allows users to protect themselves from unwanted recurring charges. Application is made available on Android and iOS platforms.

App-based solution for tracking flight delays

App-based solution for tracking flight delays. The platform showcases alternate flights in case of delays and provides statistics on flight delay patterns. App is available for the iOS platform.

6. FlightCar

Marketplace to rent parked vehicles at airports

FlightCar offers a car-renting marketplace that allows vehicle owners parking at the airport to rent out their cars to other travelers. Owners get free airport parking and renters choose from a wider selection of vehicles at lower prices than those offered by the major car rental chains. Every rental is insured up to $1 million to protect both renters and owners and every renter is pre-screened. Company ceased its operations on Jul, 14-2016 and announced that  its technology platform has been acquired by Mercedes-Benz Research & Development North America, Inc (MBRDNA). Technology will be a part of the Business Innovation division at MBRDNA, the innovation lab for new mobility services.

7. Groupize

Online platform for booking business travel

Online platform for booking business travel. The platform enables users to book and manage hotel rooms or accommodation, meeting rooms, and flight tickets as well as make event bookings. Features include payment management, schedule or itinerary management, and more. The solution can also be integrated with other expense management and third-party systems including Concur.

8. Sleepbox

Operator of tech-enabled micro-hotels

Sleepbox operates of capsule-based tech-enabled micro-hotels. Its app enables users to reserve sleep capsules in airports. The app also allows users to set the temperature, lighting, and settings of their stay as well as connect to the entertainment systems. Available for download from the App Store and Play Store. The company primarily operates the micro-hotels at airports and aims to expand to other markets (such as office spaces).

9. SmarterTravel

Online platform publishing content focusing on travel

Online platform publishing content focusing on travel. The platform provides expert help, travel tips, destination stories, travel deals, schedule plans & more.

10. LiveATC

App-based platform providing air traffic control solutions

App-based platform providing air traffic control solutions. It provides a way to listen to live conversations between pilots & air traffic controllers near multiple airports and to locate nearby airports. Their app is available for iOS, Android & Windows devices.

Explore our recently updated startup lists

• Online Travel Startups
• Online Travel Startups in Bay Area, United States
• Online Travel Startups in Berlin, Germany
• Online Travel Startups in Jakarta, Indonesia
• Online Travel Startups in Istanbul, Turkey
• Online Travel Startups in Dhaka, Bangladesh
• Online Travel Startups in Denver, United States
• Online Travel Startups in Los Angeles, United States
• Online Travel Startups in Miami, United States
• Online Travel Startups in Vancouver, Canada

Best Startups to Work in Boston, MA

Companies Hiring Now

10 Open Jobs

7 Open Jobs

4 Open Jobs

Abacus Insights

3 Open Jobs

2 Open Jobs

REsurety, Inc.

Mentor collective, 50 best startups to work for in boston, ma 2024.

Landmark Bio

Catalant Technologies

RightHand Robotics

Galatea Associates

Mobi Systems, Inc.

True Fit Corporation

Piaggio Fast Forward

Purple Carrot

Spoiler Alert

DREAM Collaborative, LLC

OneView Commerce

Seurat Technologies

Beacon Biosignals

Indico Data

Cervantes Group

SmarterTravel

Kensho Technologies

Centaur Labs

DUST Identity

Breaktime Media

Applied Value Technologies

American Robotics

Outcomes4Me

Akili Interactive Labs

What's Best Midsize Companies?

What is best places to work, be the place to be., need a raise.

50+ Boston Startups You Should Get To Know

If you couldn’t tell already from all the coffee shops, co-working spaces, and VC offices, Boston’s infrastructure screams ‘Startup Scene’. Add in top incubator programs such as TechStars and MassChallenge and it seems Boston could compete for one of the best startup hubs in the world (Facebook and Dropbox were both born there).

Global giants such as Google, Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft, Paypal, and IBM all have offices located in Boston. And with innovating machines such as Harvard and MIT centered in the city, one thing the area is definitely not lacking is top talent.

A special thanks to our friends at Coalition Space in Boston for sponsoring this list, and for sponsoring our weekly startup newsletter sharing this type of content.

1. CustomMade

CustomMade is trying to switch the retail space from big box retailers back to local ‘Makers’. This online marketplace differs from the similarly, popular platform Etsy in that customers can custom order their furniture, jewelry etc. to their own specifications.

From bed frames to engagement rings, CustomMade has found a rather niche market in the online marketplace with personal, made-to-order craft goods that has helped the company obtain more than $18M in their latest Series C.

Wish it was as easy to share your latest videos, pictures, and other content on your website, as pasting a link in your Facebook status? if so, that’s what Embedly’s working on. They help keep your site full of rich content from sources all over the web.

Using Embedly’s API you can easily display the newest articles, videos, or tweets on your website along with getting advanced analytics to see what users are actually clicking on.

3. Rethink Robotics

Robotics have had great success throughout the 20th century providing Fortune 500 companies with immensely scalable solutions in product development. The people at Rethink Robotics are trying to get smaller business to do just that; Rethink the way we view Robotics in everyday manufacturing processes.

Some people may think the companies goals are a bit too ambitious… but then again, that’s what they said when Jeff Bezos was starting Amazon, and is why Bezos joined in their latest round of funding.

4. Care.com

Healthcare is undoubtedly one of the largest emerging markets for tech innovation, especially in the US. It may seem like a daunting issue to tackle but the team at Care.com saw an even bigger market – caregiving in every way.

With over 13 million users, Care.com now helps connect caregivers and all types of living things that need care… yes you can even help find care for your furry friends too!

5. FlightCar

It was only a matter of time before the Jetsons flying car became a reality…and unfortunately that reality still isn’t here. But the guys at FlightCar are at least trying to make your life easier without having to pay for airport parking. The peer-to-peer car sharing service has been called the Airbnb of car rentals at airports.

6. Fetchnotes

Shouldn’t everything be as simple as a tweet. At least organizing your daily tasks should. Fetchnotes is a web, iOS and Android app that is as beautiful as it is simple. Using the same Twitter handles such as #’s and @’s, Fetchnotes sleekly organizes your notes.

It reminds us of Slack, so simple and intuitive it kind of makes you wonder what in the hell you did before hashtags became a thing.

7. FormLabs

What do you do after you leave college and don’t have access to the million dollar 3D printer only available in class? Make a cheaper one yourself.. duh.

Well, at least that’s what these guys from MIT chose to do after seeing a need for 3D printing in so many engineering applications if only it were cost effective.

Some of the biggest issues in the US today include not getting enough exercise, costly gas prices, and human impact on climate change. The team behind x created a simple solution to tackle these issues by creating bike sharing ecosystems.

They offer a full, one-stop shop solution including design, build, and bikes to make your University, Hotel, or Business as bike friendly as possible.

9. PowerInbox

Email is dying. So they say. At least PowerInbox would agree ‘static’ email is dying. The small software team uses email applications to stream dynamic content to your email, which helps bring revenue streams into companies looking for some extra cash flow.

10. Apptopia

Data, data, data. The web relies on it now, so why shouldn’t your apps. Apptopia provides analytics and data mining to apps on nearly every platform.

As the app stores continue to become cluttered, look for companies like Apptopia to become even more important for app discovery.

11. Wanderu

Kayak, Expedia, Hipmunk, Hopper… the list of great travel sites goes on and on. Travel websites all pitching to get you the best flight prices on the market. But what if you don’t want to fly.

As budget travel grows, maybe so will bus and train travel. Wanderu is banking on it. And it seems Millennials are more than OK to take a cheaper bus fare to enjoy an alternative way to travel.

12. GroveLabs

All the fresh groceries you picked up this week, they probably came from different places around the country (if not the world). GroveLabs believes our current system of food and agricultural production is unsustainable and downright unhealthy.

These MIT grads hacked together a vibrant ecosystem in their college dorm room and figured why not empower people to grow and eat their own healthy food, hence GroveLabs was born to help people do just that.

13. Fashion Project

Fashion Project takes old designer products and sells them at a small discount giving a large percentage to charity.

Trying to understand how to get this supply chain management to work may cause the average human being to have an aneurysm, but leave it up to 2 Harvard Law grads to make it run as smooth as the leather bags they sell.

14. RunKeeper

When Apple released HealthKit on iOS8, the world was officially ready to start getting healthy. That is, until developers started making health-related apps.

RunKeeper uses a simple map based activity tracker that is one of the best ways to game-ify your health.

15. Ministry of Supply

Men’s fashion may not be the hottest startup environment, but the Ministry believes this industry needs a reinvention. Most men don’t wear what their 1950s counterparts wore to work. Neither did they have the apparel technology that exists today.

Business situations can be stressful and the Ministry of Supply believes business attire should have the same performance technology as sports clothing.

16. Blueleaf

It seems counterproductive to take part in advanced financial services when it cost you more money than you’re probably going to gain. Blueleaf simplifies wealth management and puts out the data and information in a user-friendly workflow.

The system helps both keep services cost low and help financial advisors cut down task time and work with more clients.

17. ViralGains

Advertising is a space few startups have been able to enter and truly innovate on. ViralGains hasn’t done anything to necessarily reinvent the wheel, but instead use an extremely specific targeting to customers and brands to make sure people are only seeing the adverts they’re interested in.

Privy uses analytics on social media channels to make sense of any campaign a company may run. Mainly for multi-unit chains within the US, Privy boasts some pretty impressive stats for increasing email databases, ticket price increases, campaign redemption rates.

99% of customers will need to hit the lottery before using Bison, but for that lucky 1% the private equity software is one of a kind. For the hands on wealthy individual, having Bison will give you the visual analysis of understanding whether you wealth is tanking or booming.

The software also comes with calculations and benchmarks for making potential investment decisions.

20. Memrise

With near-global access to the internet, online education is booming with innovation. Most players are simply adding new schools with video lessons on new content, while standouts like Memrise are innovating on the science of education.

Using memory science and crowdsourced content, Memrise makes learning fun, fast, and memorable.

While most airline websites fight to give you the best price for when you want to fly, Hopper has taken the opposite approach.

They uses data-driven research to let customers know when’s the best time to fly and which airports have the cheapest flights during any specific time of year.

22. CoachUp

The popularity of competitive sports is at an all time high and there seems to be no signs of slowing it down. The days when natural talent could make someone the star player are over.

CoachUp provides athletes the forum to find experts in their sport as well as read reviews of past students. Past athletes can apply to coach willing students and bookings go through directly on the site.

Circle is a consumer finance company focused on transforming the world’s economy with secure, simple, and less costly technology for storing and using money. Users can send money instantly and free, whether sending to a friend or business. The only catch is it is currently only in digital currency.

24. Codeship

Codeship helps to release software quickly and test your deployment code. Have finished code in Github? Simply push the completed code up to your deployment target and Codeship will act as a safety net in case anything is wrong.

The promise of having this safety net save tons of time while teammates push code up to corresponding projects at different times.

25. TableList

Always want to get table service at a local night club but didn’t want to deal with the sketchy promoter? Tablelist allows you to book directly online to avoid lines, the promoter, and paying for expensive single drinks at the bar.

With a $25B global market, look for many more players to begin to join in on the nightlife tech scene.

Wymsee is working on digitizing the physical production of TV & film. Optimizing production times and crews on a digital platform could help save studios loads of money, not to mention keep a messy business a bit more organized.

What producer wouldn’t love sending their A-list actor/actress push notifications about being 20 minutes late to set!

27. Quantopian

Crowd-sourced quantitative hedge fund. That’s what Quantopian offers those brave enough to play the game. The platform allows users to build, test, and execute trading algorithms on a web browser system.

Quantopian gives people the opportunity to get a bit closer on the playing field with Wall Street’s finest.

Leaf is a platform for connecting customers and businesses. The POS system includes a powerful Android tablet that helps the business owner and customer have more interaction.

Some of the special features include sending push notification receipts, offering coupons to specific customers, and allowing customers to leave reviews. Not to mention it’s a POS that takes credit cards and has a powerful analytics software to go along with it.

29. BetterLesson

Sometimes that high school teacher or college professor just isn’t up to par with your educational plans. BetterLesson offers students the opportunity to follow core-aligned lessons from teachers with Masters degrees.

Dubbed Facebook for Teachers, there are currently over 10,000 curated lessons hosted on the site.

30. Dashbell

With the growing popularity of online marketplaces it’s never been easier to get your hotel rented out online. But with so many different platforms having booking conflicts is a weekly occurrence.

Dashbell uses API’s from the top rental marketplaces to manage your bookings all in one location.

31. Evertrue

EverTrue is a mobile & tablet education fundraising platform that connects traditional donor databases to the social graph. Picking up the phone and cold calling seems old, dated, and well not so smart.

What EverTrue does is evaluate potential donors so you’re not wasting time on dead leads.

Every college kids dream has finally come true. Fast on-demand delivery of alcohol. Simply order online and pay with a credit card and a Drizly driver will be on their way to bring you your favorite beer, wine or liquor. But don’t get too excited underage drinkers, Drizly has a proprietary ID verification system.

33. Pillpack

When you’re sick you don’t want to deal with anything. Hell, you probably can’t even think and it hurts to look down and read the label on the subscription your doctor just gave you.

Pillpack is here to solve all your painful thinking needs. Organized pills, labeled by date and time, delivered to your door.

34. Localytics

Localytics combines marketing and analytics data on a powerful and just as simple software for mobile and web apps. Specifically for e-commerce apps, Localytics allows customizable user engagement to convert more sales effectively.

35. Shareaholic

In a time when it’s hard to get your web content seen, content discovery and customer engagement are of paramount importance.

Shareaholic works with both website owners and advertisers to bring a proprietary engagement from analyzing user interests and other social analytics.

Libboo’s mission is to solve the timeless problem of talent getting lost in crowded spaces and aims to help all talented authors – published traditionally or independently – be discovered by the audiences they deserve.

As more and more content is pushed out into the world the average attention span is decreasing. Software to help artists produce more content, and get paid, will be important in the future for continued quality content.

37. Flashnotes

Crowd-sourcing hasn’t just stayed in the realm on entrepreneurial ventures and raising capital. This company has brought the crowd-sourcing, peer-to-peer marketplace of content to education.

Flashnotes is an online marketplace full of study guides, notes, flashcards and video help created by students, for students.

38. Promoboxx

The idea behind Promoboxx’s service is that local retailers are the best marketing opportunity a company as. As advertising costs rise, and in their traditional forms seem less effective, companies are looking for new ways for getting their brand out.

Promoboxx acts as a brand-to-retailer online marketing platform to co-promote each other online.

WEFT packs highly powerful logistics information into a sleek simple app. Using both sensors and supply chain analytics, WEFT helps businesses make decisions to improve their operational plans.

Big data from this application can save billions in disrupted supply chains and cargo shrink.

40. ByteLight

A first in location services, ByteLight makes LEDs “talk” to any smartphone and tablet with a camera and/or Bluetooth Smart technology that opts-in to “listen.”

While currently marketed towards indoor retail outlets, ByteLight’s application could stretch far into public venues, parks, concerts etc.

41. ezCater

As simple as the name sounds, ezCater brings food delivery on a mass scale. Office meeting, sales event, friends birthday? ezCater is the best startup to offer other startups a great catered meal.

Currently in over 22,000 cities, the marketplace for catering services is becoming stronger as more local caters jump with the service.

42. DraftKings

The multi-billion dollar fantasy sports world is new to the startup scene. DraftKings emerged as one of the first single-day fantasy sports gambling contests.

They offer free as well as paid versions of the contests for users to test out first and then partake in live betting on a wide range of sports.

43. SkyHook

Have you gotten a location based notification recently? Skyhook probably had some sort of hand in the matter.

The company realized using WiFi towers for using location based services would be the future because of precision and battery life usage. They work with services in Apple, Samsung, Sony, and Mapquest.

44. Boundless

Boundless is tackling another major issue in the US: education cost. They plan to make education more accessible and affordable by curated material onto their platform.

Under the notion that quality education is a right, the Boundless team intends to keep quality materials online for anyone to obtain the same level of basic education as any other college student.

Kinvey’s goal is to transform how businesses interact with people, data, and devices in the age of mobility. They want to take the pain away of using different backend services on every platform an app is launched on.

With Kinvey, a single backend as a service(BaaS) can be applied to all the platforms the company plans for the app to be released on.

46. SimpleTuition

Another Boston startup looking to disrupt the education scene, SimpleTuition’s goal is to make higher education affordable for all. They offer resources on loans and other forms of financial aid, as well as financing and the cost of college in different states.

They also offer advice for budgeting and costs of student life as that can often be overlooked when planning for the cost of a college education.

47. Ubersense

Ubersense uses video analysis to help people improve at sports through video coaching. Whether it be basketball, surfing, or baseball, video analysis offers a unique ability to compare and improve on past performances.

48. peerTransfer

Gives students an easy outlet to transfer money in the international location where they are studying. Students make payments in their home countries currency into the system and then peerTransfer offers a fair exchange rate to pay the school in the national currency.

49. Yesware

As email becomes more and more a form of constant communication, using apps with email becomes equally as important. Yesware offers sales analytics and tracking software to see when clients are opening emails. Other email offers include Email Templates, option to send later, and reminders.

50. CareportHealth

Careport Health is taking on another issue of the startup healthcare revolution: post-care. Seeing as 8 out of 10 acute hospital patients need post-care treatment, Careport works to connect the hospitals who first gave treatment the correct information to the following facility.

Doctors working at different facilities should still be in contact to understand a patient’s illness right? That’s Careport’s view.

51. CustomGPT

What if ChatGPT knew all your content? ChatGPT is all the rage right now, but it is trained on general website data and can’t help you with the specifics of your business. CustomGPT solves that problem.

CustomGPT works by ingesting your website content or business data like customer interactions or knowledgebases and using this information to build a custom chatbot based on that data. This chatbot can write blog posts, respond to customer inquiries, provide research insights, etc. Basically, the things you would do with chatGPT, but based on your data.

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20 Top Boston Startups to Watch in 2024

• Top Startups to Watch

Last Updated: February 2, 2024 By TRUiC Team

Boston is one of the best cities for startups, according to a report from the US Chamber of Commerce Foundation . The city has a rich history in technology and innovation ever since the founding days of the country. The two academic institutions that flood the market with top-tier talent are Harvard University and MIT. 

Using accelerators , incubators , and venture capital , these tech startups have been able to reach levels of success that make them one of the best upcoming businesses in the city. Learn about the top Boston startups , including details on what innovations the companies have created and the VC funding amount they have received.

Learn how to launch your own company by reading our comprehensive guide on how to start a startup .

Best Startups in Boston to Follow

Every year, new startups pull to the forefront of their industry through exciting innovation, tech, and industry-disrupting business models. We’ve rounded up the best Boston startups of 2024 that startup-lovers, investors, and aspiring entrepreneurs should follow.

Disclaimer: With so many exciting Boston companies launching and growing, we aren’t able to cover them all. Furthermore, the startups that are listed below are not officially ranked and are listed in no particular order.

1. LinkSquares

• Industry: Legal
• Founders: Chris Combs, Vishal Sunak
• Founded In: 2015
• Funding: Series C, $161.5 Million
• Investors Include: Catalyst Investors, Sorenson Capital

Linksquares helps in-house legal teams manage contracts effectively using a variety of online tools. Using AI, LinkSquares allows professionals to craft, review, and approve agreements as well as set up documents for signatures and manage them all from one place. The tools also track metrics and allow critical reports to help legal teams process information more quickly.

2. HourWork

• Industry: Human Resources
• Founders: Rahkeem Morris, Robert Snyder
• Founded In: 2018
• Funding: Series A, $16.3 Million
• Investors Include: Relish Works, Positive Sum

HourWork is a marketplace for employees and employers to connect and find flexible work arrangements. The platform focuses on hourly workers and the businesses that employ them. Past employees and applicants are re-engaged by HourWork and vetted for helpful feedback. Fast food restaurants or retail stores will benefit most from the networking service that HourWork brings.

3. Algorand

• Industry: Blockchain
• Founders: Silvio Micali
• Founded In: 2017
• Funding: Series A, $132 Million
• Investors Include: Borderless Capital, Tor Kenz Capital

Algorand introduces a new sustainable blockchain that has the infrastructure to be decentralized, scalable, and secure at the same time. As energy conservation becomes more prevalent, companies like Algorand will already be positioned to lead with their cutting-edge technology. Individuals will be able to make any transaction that involves the blockchain using the platform.

• Industry: Consumer Products
• Founders: Chris Bell
• Founded In: 2019
• Funding: Series A, $908.8 Million
• Investors Include: Spark Capital, SoftBank Vision Fund

Perch is more of an investment company than it is a product or service. They scour the Amazon marketplace looking for businesses with potential and acquire them in hopes of turning them into an ecommerce powerhouse. Using its years of experience, they are able to help small businesses within 60 days of acquisition.

 Feeling inspired? Learn how to launch your company with our guide on how to start a startup .  

5. Activ Surgical

• Industry: Medical
• Founders: Peter Kim, Seth Teicher
• Funding: Series B, $100.4 Million
• Investors Include: Alumni Ventures, Hikma Ventures

Active Surgical looks to improve the entire surgery process including efficiency, accuracy, patient outcomes, and accessibility. The company is building hardware-agnostic surgical software that minimizes various surgical systems. Arthroscopes, robots, and laparoscopes can all become autonomous and collaborate with surgeons. Preventable medical errors total to be the third leading cause of death and Active Surgical hope to reduce these numbers.

6. TrustCloud (Formerly Kintent)

• Industry: Software
• Founders: Sravish Sridhar
• Funding: Series A, $22 Million
• Investors Include: OpenView, Tola Capital

Compliance in business infiltrates every department and every process. TrustCloud helps automate compliance so that businesses can focus on what they do best. The software offers a risk-based assessment of company data to help identify potential areas of non-compliance. Various workflows and templates are available for different types of compliance needs.

• Founders: Nick Emmons
• Funding: Series A, $30.5 Million
• Investors Include: CoinFund, Slow Ventures

Upshot has a range of online tools that help users integrate into the Web3 universe. People are able to use analytics to read into NFT markets for better decision-making. There's also a grading index available for NFT wallets, and the Upshot API can be included in various apps and projects. Using Upshot, users will be able to explore the metaverse more efficiently and effectively.

8. Backlight

• Industry: Media
• Founders: Ben Kaplan, Cristian Livadiotti, Ed Laczynski, Fredrik Limsater, Mark Kennedy, Parham Azimi
• Founded In: 2021
• Funding: Private Equity, $200 Million
• Investors Include: PSG

Involved with media creation, Backlight offers a host of tools that allow content creators to produce, create, and distribute their projects. Using the tools, creators are able to not only make their creative vision but also scale it to reach the audience they need. Users will be able to allow content creation, post-production, production, distribution, and analysis.

• Industry: Engineering
• Founders: Dan Belcher, Izzy Azeri
• Funding: Series C, $76.1 Million
• Investors Include: Vista Equity Partners, Amplify Partners

The world of engineering requires precision so using an intelligent test automation platform can help teams move more efficiently. Mabl is constantly learning so that it can provide software testers with the most up-to-date testing possible. The goal is to make regression testing painless and smooth so that engineering teams can focus on other areas.

10. Flipside Crypto

• Industry: Cryptocurrency
• Founders: Dave Balter, Eric Stone, Jim Myers
• Funding: Series A, $61.5 Million
• Investors Include: Dapper labs, Blockchain Coinvestors

New cryptocurrencies and businesses are being created every day and information is constantly flowing into the market. To make sense of it all, Flipside Crypto has created online learning tools that allow anyone to learn the blockchain. There's a hub of on-chain data that users can access at any time and from anywhere all for free.

11. Sonde Health

• Industry: Healthcare
• Founders: Jim Harper, Jon Z Lin, Michael C. Chen
• Funding: Series B, $41.3 Million
• Investors Include: Evidity Health Capital, MP Healthcare Venture Management

Sonde Health takes medical diagnostics using any mobile device that gives people vital information on mental and respiratory health conditions. The most surprising part is it is all done using your voice. The hope of the company is to change the medical healthcare system from reactive to proactive by using preventative medicine.

12. Lightmatter

• Industry: Machine Learning
• Founders: Darius Bunandar, Nicholas Harris, Thomas Graham
• Funding: Series C, $267 Million
• Investors Include: Matrix Partners, Vikin Global Investors

The large increase in data that is transferred online is causing environmental impacts, and Lightmatter is helping to change that. They've created the first photonic chips that use less energy than electronic ones currently do. This will help data centers use less power and produce fewer carbon emissions. In addition to this, their technology is able to process data faster which will lead to new discoveries in AI.

13. Southie Autonomy

• Industry: Robotics
• Founders: Jay M. Wong, Jay Wong, Rahul Chipalkatty
• Funding: Debt Financing, $7.6 Million
• Investors Include: Bootstrap Labs, Kineo Finance

The future of industrialization is robotics, and Southie Autonomy is developing flexible automation robots for contract packaging. The technology will ensure companies have labor shortage insurance as well as improve the quality and consistency of their products. The robots are also easy to use and can be incorporated into existing packaging lines with little disruption.

14. 1upHealth

• Founders: Gajen Sunthara, Ricky Sahu
• Funding: Series C, $75.5 Million
• Investors Include: F-Prime Capital, Eniac Ventures

1upHealth is healthcare's most complete FHIR data platform. The company improves the efficiency of access to clinical and claim data in real time. The platform is built into the cloud so users can connect, control, and compute the data from any location.

• Industry: Fintech
• Founders: João de Paula, Matt Watson
• Funding: Series B, $72 Million
• Investors Include: Founders Fund , General Catalyst

Origin is an employee services startup. The company offers employees services to manage compensation, benefits, and personal finances. On a mission to empower the modern workforce to better manage their finances at any stage of life, Origin provides expert support and innovative technology to support workers.

• Industry: Real Estate
• Founders: Josh Feinblum, Konstantinos Ligris
• Funding: Debt Financing, $53 Million
• Investors Include: Morningside Venture Investments, Alumni Ventures

Stavvy is a real estate technology startup in Boston allowing users to collaborate on the platform to conduct lending, notarial, and loan servicing. Notable features of the Stavvy platform include eClosing, loss mitigation solutions, and foreclosure services for servicers and attorneys.

• Industry: Artificial intelligence
• Founders: Alex Pentland, Joshua Feast
• Founded In: 2007
• Funding: $155.7 Million
• Investors Include: Goldman Sachs, Salesforce Ventures

Cogito is an enterprise software solution that provides teams with emotional intelligence training through artificial intelligence and data-driven training. When using the Cogito platform, employees benefit from real-time training to improve their skill set while managers receive visibility into performance and improvement.

18. Tomorrow.io

• Industry: Big Data
• Founders: Itai Zlotnik, Rei Goffer, Shimon Elkabetz
• Founded In: 2016
• Funding: Series E, $270.9 Million
• Investors Include: Canaan Partners , Activate Capital Partners

Tomorrow.io is a weather intelligence platform leveraging data mining to provide real-time weather forecasts. Used by the NFL, Uber, Delta, and Ford, Tomorrow.io is a leader in weather technology to improve operational efficiency and keep businesses informed.

• Industry: Wellness
• Founders: George Hadjigeorgiou, Jonathan Wolf
• Funding: $88.7 Million
• Investors Include: Flight Fund, Accomplice

ZOE is a personalized nutrition program rooted in data from the world's largest nutrition-science study. Created by scientists from leading institutions such as Stanford Medicine and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, ZOE is an innovative step forward in human health.

• Industry: Enterprise Software
• Founders: Krenar Komoni
• Funding: Non-equity assistance, $81.8 Million
• Investors Include: Plug and Play , NextView Ventures

Tive is an enterprise solutions startup helping companies gain control over their supply chain. With Tive software, companies gain true visibility into their supply chain to monitor, troubleshoot, and improve their systems in real time, saving them time, money, and labor. 

Recommended : Check out our full list of the top startups to watch !

Final Thoughts

From enterprise software to machine learning to artificial intelligence, Boston startups are shaking up the startup ecosystem. Whether you're trying to find startup jobs or invest in a startup in Boston, there are a myriad of innovative, fast-scaling companies working to disrupt their industries to choose from. 

These are the top Boston startups to watch this year, check back regularly to review our updated list of new startups and founders making waves in Boston and beyond.

Is Boston good for startups?

Boston is a great city for startups. There are a number of resources available, including funding and mentorship, and the community is supportive. Boston also has excellent labor fluidity and risk capital infrastructure in place.

How many startups are there in Boston?

There are currently more than 4,000 startups located in the city of Boston. These companies range in industries but include blockchain, technology, and medical.

Is Boston a big tech hub?

Boston is a major technology hub and is the home of companies like Facebook, Amazon, and Google. The city has a thriving startup scene and offers plenty of resources for entrepreneurs. Boston also has a strong community spirit and is supportive of new businesses.

What are popular startup industries in Boston?

The health industry is very popular for Boston startups as well as the technology industry. Blockchain and other Web3 products and services are being created in the city as well.

What are some successful Boston companies?

Some of the most successful Boston companies are HubSpot, which is a marketing and sales software company, Akamai Technologies, a content delivery network, and Kayak Software Corporation, a travel search engine. All three of these companies have received significant venture capital funding.

How do I start a startup in Boston?

In order to start a startup in Boston , you'll need to have an innovative idea, be able to execute that idea, and have a strong team in place. You'll also need to find the right investors and make sure your company is compliant with local regulations.

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Top 20 travel startups to watch out for in 2024

1. travelperk.

• Headquarters : Barcelona, Spain
• Other office locations : Boston, Chicago, Miami, Berlin, Birmingham, Edinburgh, London
• Number of employees : 1,142 
• Funding : raised a total of $408.2M over 9 rounds

Start saving money on business travel for your company today!

2. timeshifter.

• Headquarters: New York, USA
• Other office locations: Southampton, NY, Water Mill, NY
• Number of employees: 861
• Funding: raised a total of $3.5M over 3 rounds

3. GetYourGuide

• Headquarters: Berlin, Germany
• Other office locations: Zurich, Sydney, Vienna, Paris, Hong Kong, Rome, Dubai, San Francisco, New York City, Cape Town, Barcelona, London, Rio de Janeiro and Tokyo
• Number of employees: 928
• Funding: raised a total of $5.9 billion in venture funding by 2022
• Headquarters: Saudi Arabia
• Other office locations: N/A
• Number of employees: 16
• Funding: seed round closed in February 2023

5. Lighthouse (OTA Insight)

• Headquarters: London, UK
• Other office locations: Singapore, Denver, Belgium, Sao Paolo, Dallas
• Number of employees: 411
• Funding: $80 million Series B 

6. SafetyWing

• Headquarters: California, USA
• Number of employees: 145
• Funding: raised a total of $47M over 4 rounds

7. Coindrum

• Headquarters: Dublin, Ireland
• Number of employees: 10
• Funding: raised a total of $2.9M over 2 rounds

8. Luggage Hero

• Headquarters: Copenhagen, Denmark
• Number of employees: 30
• Funding: raised a total of $3.9M over 5 rounds

9. Blacklane

• Other office locations: New York, San Diego, Miami, Dubai, Paris, Brisbane
• Number of employees: 343
• Funding: raised a total of $103M over 10 rounds
• Headquarters: USA
• Other office locations: Singapore
• Number of employees: 300+
• Funding: raised a total of $67.3M over 3 rounds

11. Roadsurfer

• Headquarters: Bayern, Germany
• Other office locations: 70+ locations 
• Number of employees: 263
• Funding: $31.3M (Series Unknown)

12. PickYourTrail

• Headquarters: Chennai, India 
• Number of employees: 5
• Funding: $4.74M over 5 rounds from 12 investors

13. Tripsider

• Headquarters: San Francisco, California, USA
• Number of employees: 50
• Funding: $1M in seed
• Headquarters: Cedarhurst, New York, USA
• Number of employees: 100 
• Funding: Undisclosed

15. Tourisfair

• Headquarters: Saabrücken, Germany 
• Number of employees: 10 
• Funding: £500-800K
• Headquarters: Austin, Texas 
• Number of employees: 12
• Funding: $4.25M in seed funding in 2023
• Headquarters: London, UK 
• Funding: $236M in funding across 35 funding rounds

18. Katanox

• Headquarters: Amsterdam, Netherlands 
• Other office locations: Manchester, Delaware, Seattle, New York 
• Number of employees: 25
• Funding: $5.7M raised by 2022

19. Greether

• Headquarters: Zurich, Switzerland  
• Number of employees: 34
• Funding: $2.2M in seed funding (July 2023) 

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22 Boston Startups to Watch in 2022

Home to some of the nation’s top colleges and universities, as well as a thriving center for scientific research, Boston never fails to produce groundbreaking new ideas and cleverly built tools that consistently set the tone for the tech industry at large. 

When you think of Boston, perhaps heavy-hitting tech leaders like DraftKings, Klaviyo and Drift spring to mind. Or perhaps splashy headlines like Toast ’s recent $33 billion valuation or Uber’s $1.1 billion acquisition of Drizly sound more familiar. 

Either way, the city’s tradition of innovation isn’t going unnoticed: The top 10 Boston tech fundings surpassed a staggering $7 billion in 2021 . In case you’re keeping tabs, that’s nearly twice the amount of cash top companies received in 2020. 

Each year, to celebrate the city’s impressive accomplishments, Built In Boston hand-selects a number of startups that have shown exceptional growth since their inception. Some stay true to Boston’s roots as a haven for healthtech, while others look to pioneer new frontiers, like the metaverse. 

No matter the company mission, you can be sure that the following 22 companies are worth keeping tabs on — in 2022 and beyond.

What they do: The healthcare-sector interoperability startup 1upHealth structures claims and clinical data to make it easier for organizations to access and share information.

Year founded: 2017

Why we’re watching: Health IT industry veteran Donald Rucker, M.D. joined 1upHealth’s leadership team last year , as the organizations’ new chief strategy officer. He previously led the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC). As part of its continued expansion, 1upHealth also recently raised $25 million in series B funding.

Abacus Insights

What they do: Abacus Insights maintains a flexible, efficient, secure data management system, ideal for allowing healthcare companies to access and interpret data.

Why we’re watching: A star player in the healthcare data space that recently raised $53.6 million in Series B funding, Abacus Insights has seen a massive increase in demand for its services due to a government interoperability mandate recently implemented to improve health information access for patients, providers, and payers. Abacus Insights hails from Dr. Minal Patel , an industry veteran with the insight and connections to lead his company into the future — as such, it should come as no surprise that the company is currently hiring for a multitude of roles.

What they do: Algorand is an open-source, payments-focused blockchain network that aims to solve one of the most persistent problems facing cryptocurrency: scalability. Its innovative, more scalable form of “proof-of-stake,” a consensus mechanism critical for securing blockchains, provides a decentralized structure for the future of finance.

Year founded: 2018  

Why we’re watching: Algorand was designed from the start as a green blockchain and is one of the world’s first carbon-negative, layer-1, public blockchains. Their native token, $ALGO, could also make Algorand an ideal platform for DeFi development — possibly even a viable alternative to Ethereum. When bitcoin was recognized by El Salvador as valid legal tender, Algorand was selected as the official blockchain platform for that project , with their native token chosen to help El Salvador develop its own blockchain infrastructure.

Beacon Biosignals

What they do: Accessing what it calls one of the world’s largest clinical electroencephalogram (EEG) databases, this neurotech startup’s AI platform for brain data enables and accelerates new treatments, as part of its overall strategy for transforming the lives of patients with neurological and psychiatric diseases.

Year founded: 2019

Why we’re watching: Late last year, Beacon Biosignals announced it had raised $27 million through a Series A funding round led by General Catalyst, which is just the latest indication that Beacon’s AI-focused approach is attractive to pharmaceutical companies seeking to better assess how their experimental brain therapies are serving patients.

Biobot Analytics

What they do: Biobot Analytics is measuring public health through wastewater. Using its founders’ MIT-acquired data management skills, the company analyzes sewage samples to track population health data, from opioid use to rates of common diseases.

Why we’re watching: The company has taken a major role in Covid-19 detection efforts, especially in the recent Omicron surge. Wastewater data has proven largely effective in tracking the prevalence of the disease in a given population, and Biobot Analytics has proven itself a thought leader in the field.

BlinkAI Technologies

What they do: BlinkAI Technologies utilizes machine learning to enhance image sensor performance, extending the range of what cameras can see and detect in the real world.

Year founded: 2018

Why we’re watching: Enhancing camera imagery for the automotive, mobile, and security industries has understandably made BlinkAI a hot commodity to investors in those quarters. Two funding rounds and $2.5 million later, the women-led company has seen substantial improvements in their lenses — which is just part of why they appeared on Built In’s 50 Startups to Watch list in 2020.

ChaosSearch

What they do: ChaosSearch develops a data lake platform that indexes cloud data, enabling search, SQL, and machine learning workloads with infinite scale, lower cost, no data movement, and faster time to insights.

Year founded: 2016

Why we’re watching: Recently named one of the Top Places to Work in Massachusetts by the Boston Globe, ChaosSearch is currently hiring across the organization and has tripled in size over this past year.

Coin Metrics

What they do: Specializing in crypto financial intelligence, Coin Metrics provides network data, market data, index, and network risk solutions to institutions operating in the crypto assets space.

Why we’re watching: Closing a $40 million Series B led by Goldman Sachs last year — little more than a year after a $6 million Series A — was a major breakthrough moment for Coin Metrics. As the company aims to become a leading provider of data-driven market insights and intelligence for institutions in crypto, it will expand globally, innovate its product, and hire to fill various open positions.

Folx Health

What they do: FOLX Health is the first nationwide digital healthcare service provider to customize medical plans for LGBTQIA+ people .

Why we’re watching: Just two months after launching last year, FOLX Health raised $25 million in Series A funding , speaking to the underserved audience it seeks to court and ensuring it can expand services into all 50 states while growing its tech and clinical teams .

Gradient AI

What they do: Responding to a need for AI and machine learning solutions for the insurance industry, Gradient AI ’s SaaS platform uses AI to help commercial insurers automate and improve underwriting results, reduce claim costs, and improve operational efficiency.

Why we’re watching: Early last year, Gradient AI raised $20 million in a Series B financing led by American Family Ventures with participation from Stone Point Capital and BSC Capital as well as existing investors MassMutual Ventures, Sandbox Insurtech Ventures and Forte Ventures. In addition to using that funding to expand its product offerings, Gradient AI has several tech jobs currently available, including for engineers and solutions strategists.

What they do: A modern engagement and talent management platform, HelloTeam enables employees to be seen, heard and valued at work, increasing their engagement and improving retention rates while allowing employers to access data-driven people strategies.  

Why we’re watching: HelloTeam’s all-in-one platform allows companies to harness performance management, employee engagement and social workplace tools — all of which became more essential than ever before during the pandemic. As companies have gone remote while supporting their workforce in a period of global uncertainty, building a resilient culture has required companies to engage employees. With this in mind, it’s no surprise that HelloTeam’s vision for a more engaged, connected, and inspired workforce is resonating widely.

What they do: An intelligent communication startup for the insurance industry, Hi Marley is reinventing the customer and employee experience through its seamless, AI-enabled texting platform . 

Why we’re watching: In a marketplace filled with startups that present new insurance alternatives, Hi Marley works alongside pre-existing insurance providers, offering a service that’s intended to assist both insurers and their customers. In addition, its culture of gratitude and recognition keeps employees happy while encouraging their professional development.

Lightmatter

What they do: Through a combination of electronics, photonics, and new algorithms, Lightmatter has built a next-generation computing platform purpose-built for artificial intelligence. Its mission is to enable the growth of computing, reduce harmful emissions associated with such growth, and democratize computing for the world of tomorrow.  

Why we’re watching: Lightmatter has rewritten the rules of processor performance scaling, and its platform bypasses the troubling dead ends that traditional transistors and ever-growing data centers run up against. It’s currently on a hiring spree.

Linus Health

What they do: Linus Health integrates the latest in cutting-edge neuroscience and AI technology with everyday digital tools, making personalized brain health an attainable goal for consumers.

Why we’re watching: With a focus on making brain health insights accessible and available to individuals and their care professionals, Linus Health is making a difference in the fight against dementia and other neurological diseases. Linus Health recently raised $55 million in Series B funding, and dozens of positions are currently available as the company prepares to open a Boston Seaport office.

What they do: A video browser-based platform for webinars and meetings, Livestorm doesn’t require a download or setup, making it a particularly viable solution for companies seeking an all-in-one communication strategy.

 Year founded: 2016

Why we’re watching: A $30 million Series B funding round late last year made it official: LiveStorm’s approach is enticing to all kinds of companies, from startups to Fortune 500s.

What they do: Overjet encodes understandings of dental disease identification into its software, allowing patients to receive more accurate and better dental care.

 Why we’re watching: There’s a dream team behind Overjet, which was founded by PhDs from MIT and dentists from Harvard School of Dental Medicine, then incubated at the Harvard Innovation Labs. Their rapid growth, which has included raising nearly $80 million in venture capital as of December , means Overjet is actively growing its internal team and plans to double the company’s employee headcount in the next six months. Working on a remote-first basis, Overjet plans to remain headquartered in Boston and has several open tech jobs currently available, including for engineers and software developers.

What they do: Silvertree ’s wellness wearable platform courts active older adults with a careful balance of safety, connection and style.

Year founded: 2020 

Why we’re watching: Silvertree’s social mission aims to modernize consumer electronics and in doing so, empower the underserved yet growing population of 55 million Americans ages 65 and older.

SmarterTravel

What they do: A digital marketing company, SmarterTravel personalizes its travel recommendations and targets travel content to U.S. consumers. Beyond mere keyword searches, the company’s proprietary algorithms result in a high-performance marketing channel that can reach both business and consumer travelers.

Why we’re watching: Initially named Hopjump, SmarterTravel recently changed their name and closed on a $9.5 million Series B co-led by Link Ventures and Second Alpha. Preparing for growth as the world emerges from the pandemic, SmarterTravel is growing their team while building new travel products — all from their sleek Cambridge headquarters.

What they do: Founded at Harvard's Innovation Labs, SoWork aims to build virtual spaces so that teams can work together from anywhere in the world. 

Why we’re watching: As Facebook’s recent rebranding as Meta has made clear, the concept of the “metaverse” will only become buzzier in 2022. SoWork’s efforts to move the world of work from physical spaces into the cloud fit right in.

What they do: This data analytics startup queries data across any database, making it instantly actionable for data-driven organizations. At the heart of its operations is Presto, a SQL query engine developed by Facebook that companies like Netflix and Twitter use to process data from anywhere.

Why we’re watching: Starburst has raised $164 million in venture funding, bringing its total valuation to more than $1 billion at the beginning of last year and leading it to achieve unicorn status. The company is hiring across all functions to support massive growth.

What they do: Stavvy seeks to transform the banking and lending industry by providing a secure digital platform that enables remote mortgage closings for homeowners and homebuyers.

Why we’re watching: Last May, Stavvy closed on a $40 million Series A . The round was led by Cambridge-based VC firm Morningside Technology Ventures, and represents the largest Series A fundraise ever for a New England fintech, according to the company. Having grown their headcount by more than 400 percent in recent years, the company plans to use this money to further fund an aggressive hiring push and is currently seeking to fill a multitude of positions.

What they do: A B2B SaaS buying platform, Vendr aims to help companies simplify their software purchases while enabling SaaS salespeople to cut through the noise. 

Why we’re watching: Vendr made Forbes’ 2021 list of the Next Billion Dollar Startups and expects revenue to triple this year. It’s not hard to understand why the tech industry has flipped for Vendr, which offers SaaS for SaaS. Early last year, Vendr closed on a massive $60 million Series A led by Tiger Global Management, which will be used to fuel product development and expand the company’s global footprint.

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Boston startup guides.

When it comes to building startups in Boston, success begets success

And from hubspot to klaviyo, it's had its share of successful exits.

When Hubspot founders Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah conceived of their inbound marketing startup in 2004, they were still graduate students at MIT, and inbound marketing was not well understood. They were able to develop that idea into a successful company and eventually went public in 2014 . Today, the Boston-based company has a market cap of over $30 billion.

There were several elements that contributed to its favorable outcome. The founders met at one of the premiere universities in the world. They had an idea, but they were at a place that nurtured ideas, in a region with experienced venture investors who saw the potential of the company. That gave them the ability to raise capital, refine their plans and grow the company. All of that was possible because they were in the Boston area.

Every city needs a success story like Hubspot, but Boston has many others including iRobot, Wayfair, Acquia and Carbon Black, to name but a few. Just last year, Klaviyo went public , adding to the parade of startup success stories. Some were bought. Some went public. But they all showed what’s possible for the many people who dream of building a successful business in the Boston area.

As these companies generate wealth for the founders, that in itself provides an angel funding system where founders flush with cash from their exits support a new generation of founders, and on it goes in this virtuous wealth-generating cycle. What’s more, these companies also produce other entrepreneurs, who leave and start their own companies, often supported financially by their old bosses.

In the lead up to our Early Stage event taking place in Boston on April 25, I spoke with some local Boston investors and advisers to help paint a picture of what makes the Boston startup ecosystem so successful.

Although there are many dimensions to a successful business ecosystem, we tend to look at the dollars invested to measure how well an area is doing. When we talk about Boston, the city is only part of it. It’s really a regional or even statewide perspective, but however you look at it, PitchBook counts venture investment dollars and puts the Boston area in fourth place nationally in Q4 2023. For a small city in a small state, that is pretty impressive.

Join us at TechCrunch Early Stage in Boston this month to hear Lily Lyman, Emily Knight, Rudina Seseri and other top founders and investors talk about essential startup skills. Register today!

Two of the other four are in California. San Francisco (to no one’s surprise) leads the way, followed by New York City, Los Angeles and then Boston. In Q4 2023 Boston closed 208 deals, good for $3.5 billion in total investment in the region.

How does Boston punch well above its weight when it comes to venture investment? Emily Knight is the president at The Engine Accelerator, an MIT spinoff that works with founders trying to convert big ideas from research labs into startups, sometimes known as “tough tech.” She says it’s a combination of factors, starting with the 35 colleges and universities in Boston alone. When you expand the map to include the Boston metropolitan area, which includes Cambridge, that grows to 44 and adds Harvard, MIT and Tufts to the list.

She says that these universities are breeding grounds for new ideas. “There is a lot of research and a lot of infant innovation being translated into companies coming out of these universities,” she said.

Image Credits: PitchBook

Lily Lyman, a partner at Underscore VC, a Boston-based investment firm, says the university system is a big reason her firm decided to launch in Boston. “It’s a huge piece of the puzzle and honestly, it’s a big reason why we are here in Boston and why we are bullish on Boston,” Lyman said. In fact, about a third of Underscore’s portfolio came straight out of the university system in the area, with a big emphasis on Harvard, MIT and Northeastern.

That leads to a second and related element of pure talent coming out of all these schools. Rudina Seseri, managing director at Glasswing Ventures, says that talent piece is so important and there is no shortage of STEM students constantly flowing out of these schools.

“If you just think of the raw talent, and then you look at where the AI and ML talent is coming from, there is an incredible pool of talent, which matches up nicely with my firm’s investments in enterprise and cybersecurity, and this region has done very, very, very well in that regard,” she said.

When you put it all together, Lyman says, you get some of the primary building blocks for a successful startup ecosystem. “The combination of the tech, the R&D that is happening here and the talent that is coming through here, it’s unparalleled,” she said.

That’s not to say that Boston isn’t lacking in certain amenities, especially for young founders, that the bigger cities have in bunches. These limitations are well documented. There is a shortage of affordable housing, the public transit system is crumbling, traffic is awful, bars close at 2 a.m. — and the city, with its Yankee modesty, is not good at promoting itself.

Seseri says that while Boston may have some limitations, every city has its own issues. She says what’s truly important is offering a place where startups can thrive. “What we can affect is how entrepreneurial-friendly and supportive we are. So from offering free spaces to more and more areas for incubators and accelerators and discovery, to providing access to customers and to platforms that can accelerate innovation,” she said.

There are indeed a number of incubators and accelerator programs like Mass Challenge, Greentown Labs, IDEA and Roxbury Innovation Center, among others offering a place to nurture early-stage ideas.

And what Boston may lack in nightlife, it surely makes up for in brain power and long history of startup success. As Seseri says, success begets success.

“I would say more than anything we need to support more founders. We need to support more successes. We need those successes so that the wheel continues spinning at a faster rate,” she said.

Boston offers a world of advantages for startup founders

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Travel to add a record US$11.1 trillion to global economy in 2024

THE travel industry’s global economic impact continues to gain ground. This year, it’s expected to reach a record-breaking US$11.1 trillion, surpassing its prior high of US$10 trillion in 2019.

 In another decade, tourism is forecast to become a US$16 trillion industry, at which point it would make up 11.4 per cent of the global gross domestic product.

Today, 1 in 10 people are employed in jobs that relate to tourism; by 2034, that will climb, with an estimated 12.2 per cent of global jobs contributing to the sector.

All this is part of the 2024 global Economic Impact Research released on Thursday (Apr 4) by the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC), the leading advocacy group focused on quantifying the industry’s economic impact at a global level. The findings, produced in collaboration with research advisory firm Oxford Economics, were shared exclusively with Bloomberg ahead of wider distribution. 

In order to create its forecasts, the analysts collect data from governments and industry groups that report on topics like international tourism arrivals and expenditures in the previous year, and combine it with proprietary, forward-looking assessments of travel supply and demand. 

To the experts at WTTC, the biggest numbers are the least surprising. The growth of the tourism industry being reported now is in step with previous projections reported by the group; last year, a similar study predicted that the sector would represent US$15.5 trillion by 2033. 

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But details within the report provide a more nuanced and notable picture: Travel’s record-setting rebound in 2023 came without much help from the Chinese and American markets, where international arrivals continued to lag significantly behind pre-pandemic levels. The likelihood that those markets will soon recover is what sets up the potential for record-breaking numbers this year. 

The 14-figure sums headlining WTTC’s report can be broken down into three types of travel transactions. Direct travel spending includes all expenses that are most clearly connected to the act of traveling: Think hotels, tours, and transportation, plus public investment in these types of services. Then there’s indirect travel spending, which quantifies the ripple effect of spending from those businesses. Among the types of expenses included in this category are sheets and towels that hotels purchase from local vendors, or ingredients purchased in bulk for the breakfast buffet. Lastly there’s induced spending, which accounts for the trickle-down effects of hospitality employees using their salaries to stimulate their local economies.

Julia Simpson, president and chief executive officer at World Travel & Tourism Council, speaking to Bloomberg from Boston, says that the US travel sector has been one exception because of how the dollar has strengthened, making a trip to the States more expensive for people in countries that are struggling with inflation.

Ongoing visa delays have also been a factor, she adds. US inbound international visitation spending remains at more than 25 per cent below pre-pandemic levels. In China, visitor spending lags by 60 per cent, making it the least-recovered tourism economy out of 185 countries in WTTC’s report. 

Also notable is the fact that more money continues to be spent on domestic travel versus international trips. This year, it will make up a record US$5.4 trillion, a 10 per cent increase from 2019 levels. 

All told, 142 out of the 185 surveyed countries are expected to exceed their 2019 tourism performance levels in 2024, and almost all of those are additionally expected to see year-over-year growth. That means that not only will the travel economy at large be breaking records this year–assuming all pans out as expected–but it will break records at each of those local levels, too. 

“Travel isn’t just back, travel is booming,” says WTTC’s Simpson. “We’re talking about a really, really strong sector.” BLOOMBERG

KEYWORDS IN THIS ARTICLE

• Singapore hotels’ average room rate rises in February as tourist arrivals inch higher

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Boston cybersecurity startup Aura replaces State Street’s Fenway sponsorship

Red Sox fans arriving at Fenway Park for opening day on April 9 will see a new and less familiar name sponsoring the team’s prominent luxury pavilion above home plate.

Cybersecurity startup Aura, based in the Seaport, is taking over sponsorship of the 1,500-seat pavilion level, plus the associated premium club and a dozen luxury suites. Aura, founded in 2019, replaces 232-year-old Boston bank State Street Corp., which has sponsored the pavilion since it was added in 2006.

The Red Sox and Aura said the sponsorship is a multi-year deal but declined to disclose the cost.

State Street confirmed it was ending its sponsorship after 18 years. “State Street has been proud of our partnership with the Red Sox,” the company said in a statement to the Globe. “We will continue to invest in opportunities to support the local community we call home – such as employee volunteerism, event sponsorships for our nonprofit partners, and State Street Foundation’s grantmaking.”

The new deal is part of Aura’s marketing strategy to boost its profile as it seeks to follow in the footsteps of local tech companies such as DraftKings and Wayfair that created well-known consumer brands. Aura’s all-in-one software for consumers includes an antivirus app, password management, credit monitoring, parental controls, and identity theft protection, and competes against services from better-known brands like McAfee and Norton.

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“We’re a Boston-based company, I’ve always been a Boston-based entrepreneur,” Aura chief executive Hari Ravichandran said in an interview. “So we have a great love for the city.”

It took the company just days to decide to take the Pavilion sponsorship when it became available, the CEO said. “We’re in the family safety space,” Ravichandran said. “The demographics, obviously, are very family focused in baseball.”

Aura sells its cybersecurity apps as a subscription with plans for individuals starting at $9 per month and family plans as low as $20 a month.

Last year, the company attracted Oscar-winning actor Robert Downey Jr. to join its board and become the face of its marketing campaign. Now, fans at the park will see a Boston-specific pitch for Aura’s apps from Downey on the Jumbotron. A national brand campaign starring the “Iron Man” actor kicked off in January.

Aura has raised $650 million from investors and was valued at $2.5 billion in 2021, the company said. Still, the company has a long way to go to reach the brand recognition of rivals like McAfee and Norton – and tech giants Apple, Google, and Microsoft have been adding cybersecurity features as well.

As part of the sponsorship, Fenway’s pavilion level has been updated and refreshed. During games, fans will be able to order food to their seats including an “Aura burger.” The club area will also be available to rent for private events of up to 450 people on non-game days.

The Red Sox want major sponsors to be local companies to emphasize the team’s connections to the city, according to Troup Parkinson, executive vice president for partnerships. Aura may be a “younger company” compared to State Street or other ballpark sponsors such as MassMutual and Boston Beer, but still represents a major sector of the local economy, he said. “We take it very seriously who we are going to work with,” Parkinson said.

What’s next for Aura? The stock market is growing more receptive to tech company initial public offerings, but Aura isn’t ready quite yet, Ravichandran said.

“The second half of next year could be a good time ... to take [Aura] out to the public markets,” he said.

Correction: Aura has raised $650 million from investors. A prior version of this story misstated the amount.

Aaron Pressman can be reached at [email protected] . Follow him @ampressman .

Big Tech's inside job

Silicon Valley used to reward innovation. Now it strives to sabotage it.

Received wisdom in the tech world is that big, legacy companies are bound by inertia. The more established they are, the more they get set in their ways — and the more vulnerable they are to disruption by a nimble startup . Silicon Valley was founded on the principle that newcomers can move fast and break things — leading to world-transforming innovations.

For the most part, though, that's not how it works anymore. Last year, a couple of economists found that venture-capital-backed startups almost never lead to a new company listing on a public stock exchange . They don't replace the tech giants — they just get bought by the tech giants. That's been true in Silicon Valley for at least a decade. And the vast majority of startups have been acquired by the same five companies : Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft.

Ever since Joe Biden was elected, the Federal Trade Commission and the Justice Department have been looking into tech mergers and acquisitions for evidence of antitrust behavior. Have the tech giants been illegally short-circuiting competition by buying up their rivals? It's a really good question — but it may be the wrong one to ask. A new paper by two leading scholars suggests that these days, Big Tech doesn't have to resort to buyouts to crush aspiring startups. Instead, they're using their considerable cash and soft power to defang potential rivals from within — a process the scholars call " co-opting disruption ."

According to the new paper — by longtime tech observers Mark Lemley at Stanford University and Matt Wansley at Cardozo School of Law — the tech giants are deploying a bunch of sneaky corporate judo moves to undercut their competitors. When an innovative threat to their business model comes along — everything from self-driving cars to virtual reality to artificial intelligence — they make a point of helping the promising little startups. They take a seat on their board of directors. They give them huge infusions of cash and access to selected data. They even lobby the government on their behalf. But all the while, the scholars found, Big Tech is actually using its seemingly benevolent show of support to protect its own interests — subtly steering the startups away from innovation, and into projects that reinforce the status quo. By working from within, they're turning the baying wolves of ambitious startups into harmless, well-trained lap dogs.

This problem isn't academic. Co-opting startups not only quashes competition — it kills off meaningful innovation. Nearly all of the self-driving-car companies have shifted away from their big-vision plans for robot taxis to small-bore stuff like adaptive cruise control. Virtual-reality companies are working on virtual meeting software for the metaverse. AI companies that might have revolutionized drug discovery or engineering optimization are instead fiddling around with search, or customer service, or college-essay writing. With fewer rivals rising to challenge the incumbents, the pace of innovation slows. Some economists even think other startups in the same lanes as the co-opted ones stop trying as hard, for fear of getting bought up and killed off by Big Tech.

This new theory of anticompetitive behavior could be a game changer when it comes to curbing the unprecedented power of the tech giants. It offers regulators a way to crack down on monopoly-minded companies before they try to buy up innovative young guns. "The traditional way of thinking about the threat to innovation from reduced competition has to do with market concentration," Wansley says. "Now we're taking it a little further. We're saying, by the time you get to an acquisition stage, that might be too late."

Lemley and Wansley start their inquiry with a question: Why have two decades elapsed since the rise of the last massive, world-dominating disruptive company in tech? Apple and Microsoft were founded in the mid-1970s; Amazon and Google in the 1990s. Facebook, the baby of the bunch, was founded in 2004. The iPhone came out in 2007. What do we have to show for the past 20 years of venture capital?

The answer appears to be: just another industry that's terrified of competition. At this point, Big Tech looks at promising startups the way evil alien empires in science fiction look at helpless planets. Sometimes they act like the Borg from Star Trek, assimilating the "biological and technological distinctiveness" of competitors to make themselves more badass. Here on Earth, buying up little guys to gain access to their technology or personnel is called an "acqui-hire," like when Facebook bought Oculus and turned it into Quest . And if the smaller company doesn't want to be acqui-hired? Well, resistance is futile.

Or sometimes, like the genocidal, xenophobic Daleks from "Doctor Who," powerful companies just straight-up exterminate their competition. In 2021 a team of researchers from Yale and the London Business School found that somewhere between 5.3% and 7.4% of mergers and acquisitions in the pharmaceutical industry were " killer acquisitions ." The smaller company had a drug that might have someday threatened the big guy's category-busting pill, and: pew pew . No more little guy.

In a sense, a dominant company has no choice but to act this way. It can't really innovate anymore — not with thousands of middle managers defending fiefdoms, clients and customers bought into a product and marketing cycle, and hundreds of millions of dollars invested in technical infrastructure. Real disruption would be, well, disruptive. 

"This is not something that people write about or talk about, not something that surfaces regularly," Lemley says. "But it's in the air if you're in Silicon Valley and talking to venture capitalists. It's a problem."

And the bigger the company, the greater the financial risk of any disruption, no matter how small. Like an evil king facing a prophecy that he will one day be overthrown by a firstborn child from the forest realm, the company has to kill all t he children, just to be sure.

The thing is, mass murders of forest-realm firstborns tend to attract the attention of regulators. So what if the evil king just adopted all the babies? Raise them rich and spoiled in the castle, distract them with nubile romantic prospects, teach them to exploit the peasants? Between assimilation or assassination lies "a third possibility," Wansley says. "It's not that the acquirer is going to take the startup and totally shut the technology down. It's that they will redirect the assets to something more profitable."

That's what the tech giants are doing. How? First, by relying on Silicon Valley's network of venture capitalists as an early-warning system for would-be disruptors. VCs see trends and startups that might someday pose a threat to the established order — so-called nascent competitors — before anyone else. And there's nothing stopping them. As Lemley observes, it's part of Silicon Valley's "natural information flow" for an investor to tell a Google or a Microsoft about the promising newcomers they're backing. "If I'm a VC, how am I going to get the best deal for my client in this space?" Lemley says. "The best deal might be, sell out to the incumbent."

Once a tech giant gets a tip-off about a startup that might threaten their bottom line, they're able to strategically invest their vast cash reserves in the fledgling firm. That's precisely what's taking place with artificial intelligence: Microsoft owns 48% of OpenAI, the emerging field's undisputed leader. Alphabet and Amazon have put billions of dollars into the AI startup Anthropic. When the two AI companies were founded, Wansley says, both were "worried about what would happen if one of the tech giants started looking in their direction." Now, both are directly influenced by the very companies they set out to disrupt. And since investments from Big Tech often come with a seat on a startup's board of directors, Wansley adds, the tech giants are in an ideal position to "start nudging the company in a direction that's going to be less competitive."

Money isn't the only weapon that Big Tech can deploy to co-opt a potential competitor. Because the tech giants have amassed huge repositories of data on user behavior , they can choose with whom they share that data, and how much. Documents leaked from the discovery phase of a lawsuit against Facebook in 2015 showed that the company doled out data access preferentially , allowing its allies more access than its potential competitors. The data that Big Tech shares — or doesn't share — can play an instrumental role in shaping a startup's work.

Finally, the big companies use their clout on Capitol Hill in an effort to impose stricter regulations on the startups they're ostensibly trying to help. That's why tech giants like Meta testify before congressional hearings and ask for more government oversight for emerging threats like robot cars, or AI. They want to ensure that the rules favor them — and disfavor startups outside their zone of protection. Big Tech may hate regulation, but it doesn't mind using it to regulate any startups that might wind up threatening its dominance in the marketplace.

Co-opting startups is a clever strategy. It's way easier — and less obvious — than buying up a competitor and shutting it down. And if it doesn't work, the nuclear option is always available. "If all those other strategies fail — investments, taking a seat on the board, playing hardball with data networks, and regulation — if none of them prevents a competitor from growing, then the tech companies can buy it off," Wansley says. "It's a little subtle, right?"

People are still founding startups. But more and more, they're basically serving as farm teams for the majors.

It is — but that's what makes it so effective. Straight-up killer acquisitions are relatively easy to prove, says Florian Ederer, an economist at Boston University. "It's much, much harder to prove that a company got taken over and its focus got slightly shifted to not competing quite so intensely." It's even harder to prove that consumers suffered any ill effects. The co-opted companies don't get killed off, and they stay nominally independent. The founders and investors get rich either way.

So how do we know startups are getting co-opted by Big Tech? One proof is that some of Silicon Valley's most powerful players are starting to grouse about it. Elon Musk is suing OpenAI to keep the company from sharing its tech with Microsoft. The venture capitalist Marc Andreessen tweeted last month that Big Tech and the "New Incumbents" in AI are " lobbying as a group with great intensity to establish a government protected cartel ." You know things are bad when the biggest kids on the block start whining about being victims.

Wansley and Lemley argue that regulators need to step in — not to restrain competition, but to unleash it. For starters, they say, the feds should strengthen and enforce existing rules against "interlocking directorates," which are supposed to prevent executives from sitting on the boards of their competitors. In the 2000s, the CEO of Google was on Apple's board! These days that kind of thing gives the feds a frowny face; in 2022, the Justice Department pushed seven directors representing venture firms to resign from the boards of five of their direct competitors in space, edtech, and green energy. Microsoft currently enjoys a seat on OpenAI's board of directors. Technically it's only an observer role, without a vote. But, come on.

The primary goal of the scholars I spoke with is broader than any specific regulation: They just want to get government watchdogs to recognize the new and subtle ways that tech giants are shutting down competition and innovation. Sure, people are still founding tech companies, and their startups are still getting funded. But more and more, they're basically serving as farm teams for the majors. "The incumbents have gotten much more attuned to competitive pressures from nascent competitors, and address them more aggressively and earlier," Ederer says.

Regulators, for their part, appear to be catching on. In late January, the Federal Trade Commission ordered three titans of tech — Amazon, Microsoft, and Alphabet — to open the books on their investments in artificial intelligence. OpenAI and Anthropic received the same letter: Send over every scrap of documentation on the financial ties between them and the massive incumbents that are funding them. 

That's a promising start. If technology is going to do what it always has — solve big problems, build value, create jobs and opportunity — Silicon Valley needs as much competition as possible. "We used to have these cycles of competitive disruption," Lemley says. "Microsoft runs the world, and the internet comes up, and they missed it. IBM runs the world, and the Dells of the world come up, and they're no longer in charge. That's what we'd like to get back." Startups once unlocked a golden age of tech innovation. Perhaps, if we can find a way to keep them from being co-opted, they can do it again.

Adam Rogers is a senior correspondent at Business Insider.

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